Child of Fire, Child of Ice-A Sci-fi Romance Series (The Waljan Chronicles Book 1)

by JB Trepagnier

  Elan took it for the truth. He had all his hopes into that bonding. He would always ask if Isolde was pretty and how he could make it so she would like it too. Botak gave the boy a guide to pleasing this girl and kept wishing Tati hadn’t forbidden courtesans.

  Botak watched the two people their future depended on disappear down the corridor with a sigh. This could go horribly wrong. They arranged marriages on both planets, but it was always to someone you had met before and in most cases, took lessons with growing up. It wasn’t a total stranger from a different planet that you were told you had a strange bond with.

  He knew what the two of them had been told. He knew they had been prepared, but they had also both been told lies. What if the girl didn’t like him and didn’t want to? What if she insulted Elan and he didn’t want her anymore?

  Chapter 3

  Elan had Isolde picked out before he was supposed to hear her in his head. He hated they kept Avalians as slaves and learned all their faces. When they got to the new planet, no one would keep slaves again. He hoped Isolde would be with him on this. There were eight Avalian slave girls that brought out the cart and he easily picked out the new face before she could bend her head and hide it with her hair. She looked so different than he did, but he found her beautiful from the brief look he got from her.

  He thought about playing with her and announcing she was his new toy before she identified herself. He thought it would break the ice and they could laugh about it before they attempted to bond. He didn’t know if she was already frightened, being on a strange planet, so he just waited. It was strange. He had been told she would be hidden among the slaves and would call out to him to let him know who she was, but it was almost like she had been told something different. He couldn’t hear her in his head at all, but he could feel something drawing him to her.

  He just played along and tried not to punch the guards when they threw her at his feet. He just snapped to bring her to his chamber and expected them to follow. He would apologize for her rough treatment once they were alone. When the door shut, he felt like she was trying to do something in his head again, but wasn’t succeeding. He wasn’t biting this time and this wasn’t part of the plan.

  “What are you trying to do exactly?” he demanded, crossing his arms and glaring at her.

  Her green eyes looked surprised, then she hid it. “It must not work on you for some reason. I guess we’re going to have to do this the hard way. Please, trust me and hear me out before you run to your mother.”

  Had she been told the lie they kept public that he was overly attached to his mother and wouldn’t do anything without asking her first? The entire court thought he was a coddled virgin who still played with his soldier dolls. He couldn’t take it from her too. She was expecting one man, he was going to show her the real one.

  He ripped his baggy, padded shirt off to reveal a chest sculpted with muscle from training with Botak and blowing off steam at night in the fighting pits under a fake name. He had a two-inch scar on his chest when someone pulled a knife in the pit and cut him. Botak made him wear the padded shirts to make him look portly and soft to the court.

  Isolde only came up to his chest. He walked over to her and grabbed her shoulders. He forced her to look at his scar. “Do I look like a man who still plays with dolls?” he growled.

  “Why would my uncle lie? Why do you pad your shirt and why does everyone here believe that about you? Why do you allow it?” she asked, sinking down on a floor pillow. He took the one across from her. She didn’t give him a chance to answer. “Why do you put pillows on the floor instead of sitting on a chaise?”

  “What’s a chaise?” he asked wrinkling his nose. “As for me allowing people to believe things about me, I imagine you’ve got lies floating about Avala too, as do the rest of the sixteen.”

  “Not like that. They just think we don’t have the gifts they thought we would. You’re going to be king. I thought I was coming here to meet with a man-child.”

  He could be honest with Isolde, unlike everyone else who knew him except Botak. “It was necessary. You don’t understand because you’re a girl.”

  Isolde was on her feet, angry and pacing in seconds. “I’ve had to listen to my mother’s thoughts since I was a child that she wished I was a boy. Jovin trains me like he thinks I’m a boy. I’m just as strong as you are! Do I need to take my shirt off too?”

  “Isolde, please! Do you want to come sit in the hot spring in my chamber so we can find out exactly what lies we’ve been told? I’ll see how strong you are then.”

  “I don’t know what a hot spring is.”

  “It’s water from under the ground that stays hot. It’s nice on your muscles after training.”

  “You don’t use electrodes that vibrate the muscles?”

  “Heat is good for muscles too. The spring is relaxing and we can talk.”

  He was trying anything he could to get her to open up and relax. He wasn’t the one that lied to her for so long, but he was the one bearing the brunt of her suspicion right now.

  “We only use heat in small bursts. My uncle tried to cook me in one of our ovens. I’ll get sick if I sit in water. You die if you do that on Avala. This was stupid. You plotted to get me here to kill me.”

  “Isolde, I’ve never been to Avala, but I know about your water. I’m sure you noticed the bugs when you got here? Your water kills your people, our bugs kill my people. This is why you and I are important. None of the other sixteen are supposed to bond like we are. Don’t you think that’s important?”

  “I’m not getting in that spring if it looks dirty,” she snapped, following him to the back of his chambers. “I don’t think we will bond at all. I think someone put us together because they wanted to see what would happen when your people and mine have a child. They chose us because the others will follow our lead.”

  He had been waiting so long to meet her and she didn’t even want to be here with him. No one had talked him up to her. They lied. She was here because she was a princess and it was her duty, not because she wanted to.

  “Tati, my Pawswearsea, wouldn’t lie to me just to make a baby. We are bonded and she thinks you and I will do the same.”

  “My Qunelope, Soelva, told me the same lie.”

  He led her over to the pool cut into the black rock. The steam floated off the water like it always did. He dumped lavender pods into the water to make it smell good, then he realized she didn’t know what they were.

  “It makes the water smell good. Look down, you can see to the bottom. The water is clean.”

  He undressed to his shorts and slipped into the water while she was still studying the pool to see if it would make her sick. She was way less embarrassed than he was. She yanked the oversized hunter’s tunic over her head like she trusted the water, but not him. She would have made a fair go in the fighting pits now that she was standing at the edge of the pool nude. She was thin and he knew that was so she could pass as a slave, but she was cut with lean muscle. He was glad the water came up to his chest because the longer she stood there staring, the more blood pooled in his crotch. He was sure that wasn’t happening now because she hated him.

  She finally lowered herself into the pool, but sat as far from him as possible. “Why the elaborate farce? And why was I told the same lies as your people?”

  “I didn’t say it was different because you’re a girl to be offensive and because I want you to be a boy. I’m glad you’re a girl. I don’t know what it’s like on Avala, but here, we have arranged marriages. The men are expected to start taking courtesans as soon as the urge hits and women are expected to be pure on their wedding night. The assumption is that the man will teach his wife to be the lover he needs and if she won’t do something, he’s got a courtesan for that. We are meant to bond the way men use courtesans. It had to be something extreme for them to believe I hadn’t mowed my way through all of them by now like my father had.”

  “I still don’t think—”


  “Please? Let me speak? All you know of me is lies and I don’t know much about you either. I wanted to visit the courtesans. I thought it would help me when we bonded. Tati explained to me we needed to learn together, not me teaching you what I like. I need to learn what you like too. This needs to be the standard for the new planet too.”

  “My father married my mother because he had to, but he loved his first courtesan. I’m less worried about courtesans and more worried about slaves. Do you only care about sex?”

  “Isolde!” This girl was infuriating. They had only just sat down to talk and she took everything he said the wrong way. “I want to get rid of slaves too. I knew who you were before you got into my head because I learned the faces of all our slaves.”

  “All your slaves or just the female ones so you could get an idea of what I’d look like?”

  “Do you think the worst of everyone or just me because of where I was born?”

  “I don’t care where you were born. Everything I was told about you was a lie. Someone made that decision and my uncle has always looked out for me before. Now I’m expected to ignore all the lies I’ve been told and use everything I was taught from the courtesans to please you like I don’t think all of this stinks and someone is up to something. It could just as easily be you.”

  “I had no idea you believed the lie everyone else believes. I think I know who is responsible, but I don’t know why. He’s the reason everyone here believes it. Your uncle was either in on it or he had no idea. Perhaps we should call Botak in here for answers.”

  “What were you told about me?” she demanded.

  “Not a lot. I was told you would give me a signal who you were and not to be alarmed if I heard you in my head. You weren’t just giving me a signal. You were trying to do something, but I don’t know what. When you thought I was just some innocent boy at his mother’s teat who still played with dolls, you were trying pretty hard to get my attention and get me in bed. Now that you know that’s not true, you’re ready to pack up and go back home. Do you want a weak man like that? Does that attract you? I got out all my frustrations waiting for you in those bloody fighting pits and I wore padded shirts that were hot so I would look good for you. Now, you hate me and want to leave and I didn’t even know you were being lied to!”

  “I’m going to freeze this pool if you keep yelling at me,” she snapped climbing out.

  He had to haul himself out and chase her dripping wet. She had clothes here. Clothes fit for a princess, even if they were in the Cendian style and not what she was used to. Maybe that would calm her down a little.

  Chapter 4

  Isolde was furious, but she didn’t know with who. She knew she should have been glad to know her future husband was really a hidden warrior and all the lies were for the two of them, but someone should have told her. She knew she shouldn’t be taking it out on Elan, but there was no one else here. She looked so different than he did, she couldn’t exactly ask him to take her to the fighting pits he mentioned to blow off steam. Or, maybe he could.

  “Do people fight their slaves in your fighting pits? Like, for sport?”

  Elan’s red eyes narrowed at her. “You may have a bad impression of my people, but we do not send slaves to die. We may not feed and clothe them in a way I think it proper, but we don’t use them like that,” he snapped.

  She sighed and collapsed on the strange floor pillows. “I didn’t mean it like that. I meant it more, could you take me there to fight and no one asks questions.”

  “Can you please put one of the sleeping gowns on? Women here do not fight in the pits. They do it in secret with words. I prefer my fists to my mother’s games.”

  She slipped a silk gown over her head. The material was soft and they didn’t have anything like it at home. It had two tiny straps and was cut low in the front and back. She knew what this gown was for. Did they expect her to do that the entire time she was here? Didn’t they just need to do it once if the whole bond thing wasn’t a lie?

  “Does your mother know about me? Was she a part of the lies?”

  Elan cleared his throat. “Um no. My mother probably thinks we really are in here playing with toys. She was the easiest to fool because she wanted me the way you thought I was.”

  “Why? My mother had me beaten for dropping one of the weapons we developed after people stopped losing powers. She thought since there was no way she could have been pregnant, I was going to be this all-powerful gift from the gods.”

  “My mother had been trying to get pregnant for a long time. Then, my father up and dies and she’s suddenly pregnant after so long. She never left her bed and had all her meals brought up. She didn’t want me to be a warrior or one of the special sixteen, she just wanted me to be her son.”

  “And you lied to her too. You could have shown her you can protect yourself just fine.”

  “You don’t get it, Isolde!” Elan yelled. Every single tapestry on the wall fell down and a wine glass flew against the wall with no one throwing it. “My mother was petrified for me. I kept her mind at ease and made myself look bad for her and for you. Not every battle is fought with weapons. If I knew the right word to end this battle, I’d say it.”

  “It didn’t work on you. I can make people do things when I get into their heads. You knew what I was doing. Why didn’t you call your guards?”

  “That my future queen was trying to seduce me in a hall full of people? I’ve been thinking about that all the time. Why would I call my guards? I was already told you could speak to me in my head. Maybe you’re not supposed to be able to do that to me because we are bond mates.”

  “Humans have never bonded with other humans like we do with our animals. It’s a trick. Maybe I can’t do it to Cendians at all.”

  Elan gave her this lopsided grin and went bounding out the room. She had no idea what he was doing, but she really just wanted to get everything over with and sleep. It was late when she finally went out with that pastry and it was after midnight now. How much longer did Elan want to drag this out? She had to sleep with him and they’d have to marry, but no one said they had to like each other.

  Elan came back with an older man who seemed to know her and bowed. He introduced him as Botak, his cousin. Elan looked at Botak like he was just as angry as she was.

  “Is there any reason my betrothed believes the lies my people do?”

  “It gave you something to talk about, didn’t it? It gave you the opportunity to impress her with what you are really like.”

  “No, it pissed her off and now she hates me. She wants to turn around and go right back home. You ruined everything!”

  She never said anything about going back home. She was going to see this out even if it turned out she and Elan couldn’t stand each other. They would rule side by side and find a way to deal with it the way kings and queens with arranged marriages had always done.

  “Jovin told me you were stubborn and needed to be beaten sometimes,” Botak said, scratching his chin. “I don’t want to beat my future queen.”

  She launched herself at Botak, but kept her ice at bay. Elan easily caught her when she went for Botak’s eyes. No one was ever beating her again. If Botak and Elan thought they could punish her that way because that was how it was done here, they had another thought coming.

  “You aren’t beating her!” Elan yelled as he struggled with her. “No one is laying a hand on her. You need to be apologizing to her for lying for so long, not threatening to beat her. What the bloody hell is wrong with you? Do you want to stay here with the swarms instead of going to the paradise planet?”

  She managed to fight Elan off. She tore the silk sleeping gown off and stomped off to where the handed down men’s clothes were. She slipped the hunter’s tunic and leggings back on. Elan and Botak saw she was no longer dressed for bed and thought she was going home.

  “You two need to get your story straight. You both tell so many lies, perhaps you need to sit down for the rest of the night and figure ou
t what the truth actually is. No one is ever beating me again. I’m sleeping with the other slaves tonight. I’m not going home and I intend to see this through, but I will not lie with you until you start telling the truth,” Isolde snapped.

  “But, the bonding—” Botak started.

  “Will happen when the lies stop. We aren’t going to have some magical bond. It’s just sex and I’ve made it possible he will not put his child in me until I say so. If your big plan is a baby, that’s not happening tonight either.”

  She couldn’t be seen slamming out Elan’s room like they just had a fight. Everyone thought she was a slave. She let her eyes go to the floor and pretended to be meek and she snuck off to find a place to sleep with the other slaves.

  Chapter 5

  Elan was glad the walls were thick because he lit into Botak until the sun came up. Apparently, Isolde viewed him as the same weakling everyone else did and thought he was totally ignorant about her. She had been told none of the factions were able to get close to him to teach him because he was too attached to his mother. She had come prepared to influence him with her mind to get him to bring her to his chambers, eventually get him in bed, then try to teach him to use fire on her own, even though she couldn’t even wield it.

  Apparently, her uncle thought that was the best story to tell her. Botak never told him this, but her uncle felt like if she wasn’t a princess, she would have made a good war general or been good at training troops. She was a fierce hunter and when she bonded with her animal when she was younger than he was, she insisted on going hunting alone with just her spear. When she finally came back into the clearing Jovin was waiting for her in, she was grinning and covered in blood like she had the time of her life.